Game 5 will tell if Blackhawks crack Chara code

BOSTON, MA - JUNE 17: Zdeno Chara #33 of the Boston Bruins checks Bryan Bickell #29 of the Chicago Blackhawks to the ice late in the game in Game Three of the 2013 NHL Stanley Cup Final at TD Garden on June 17, 2013 in Boston, Massachusetts.

Photograph by: (Photo by Jim Rogash/Getty Images)
, Canada.com

CHICAGO — It’s hard to miss Zdeno Chara, but the Chicago Blackhawks somehow managed the feat. The Bruins star was on the ice for five goals against in Game 4, five out of six, and therefore became a popular common thread. Led by captain Jonathan Toews, the Blackhawks started talking about Chara like he was something other than a looming man-god, a natural disaster of a man, as if they had cracked the code a little. He didn’t like to get hit. He could be exploited, here and there. It was commendable honesty. It will be even more commendable if they were correct.

“I think it’s just the way we’ve been playing,” says Chicago forward Andrew Shaw. “We played great offence. They’ve got a lot of great players, but it’s tough playing against (Patrick) Kane and Toews and even our front there with (Bryan) Bickell. It’s tough for him. It’s best on best.”

“(If it’s best-on-best), I love our chances,” says Bruins forward Chris Kelly. “They’re challenging Z, that’s a good thing. That’s really all I can say. Z’s been this franchise’s best player probably since he’s gotten here, and he’ll continue to be this franchise’s best player.”

The five goals, in fairness, were not Chicago players scaling the mountain in some furious and single-minded assault; they were, more often, team goals. Yes, Chicago is taking runs at the mountain, just as the Toronto Maple Leafs did in the first round. (“That’s why they put Bickell on that line, to finish his checks on Chara, drive to the net, battle,” says Shaw.) Yes, in Game 2 Chara looked strangely unsteady with the puck.

But Game 4 wasn’t just about Chara. Twice the giant Slovak was left behind on a 2-on-1, which is where speed comes in; on the first he closed on Brandon Saad just as the rookie slipped a perfect pass to Michal Handzus; on the second, Michael Frolik evaded Chara’s giant sliding body like it was a log rolling down a hill, and slid a pass to Marcus Kruger, who scored. It can be argued that Chara did not play the odd-man rushes perfectly, but then, Boston’s whole scheme is designed to avoid that eventuality in the first place. Without turnovers, with a better forecheck, Chara doesn’t have to dance.

On the Toews goal, Chara appeared to get tripped — or slew-footed, though the intent was not exactly clear — by Bickell’s skate in front of the net, and was still getting up when Toews deflected a point shot. Patrick Sharp’s power-play goal came just after a 5-on-3 had expired, and Sharp was on the far side of the net, away from Chara. And on Brent Seabrook’s winner, Chara did not dislodge Toews from the front of the net, which forced Rask to lean his head to the left to find the puck. But that wasn’t the primary screen.

“Maybe it was a coincidence that he was on the ice,” says Kane, “maybe it’s not.”

“I just think that was a fluke game,” says Sharp, who scored twice, and who remained proud of the celebration that saw him pump his fist once before falling down. “To think we have anything figured out is ridiculous. He’s a great player. I don’t think Boston cares who’s on the ice for five goals; they’ll have him out there every opportunity they can. That’s a great player, one of the best in the league.”

And that is where best-on-best comes back in. These two teams have been so very close through four games, but the differences are evident. Chicago wants to play with speed; Boston wants to negate that speed. Chicago’s high-end skill players, starting with Kane and Toews and Sharp, are designed to pry apart opposing defences. Boston’s bulwarks, Chara and Dennis Seidenberg and Patrice Bergeron, are designed to declaw great lines. In Game 4 Chara was almost exclusively deployed against Toews, Kane and Bickell at even strength, with the Bruins splitting their forward lines between Bergeron’s line and David Krejci’s. And best-on-best, Chicago was a little better, in part because they decided not to game-plan Chara quite so much.

“Being able to crack him, I think it’s what we did as a team, more than focusing on him,” said Blackhawks rookie Brandon Saad. “Speed, getting pucks in deep, that aggressiveness is how we have success. I don’t think it mattered who was on the ice; he just happened to be on the ice when we scored.”\

If Chara is wearing down, it may be because he’s played 48 more minutes than any player in the post-season — Chicago’s Duncan Keith is second — but the matchup of best-on-best is part of what has made this series so compelling.

“I don’t know if there’s anything to be made of it,” said Bruins defenceman Andrew Ference. “If that’s the game plan, that’s the game plan … everybody, at this point, is a target. You’re trying to wear everybody down.

“It just depends on a shift-by-shift basis, who does the better job. That’s, I think, the only way to look at it. You can play 30 great shifts but if you play a bad one, it swings the other way. So I think it’s just whoever’s more consistent in what they’re trying to accomplish, and whether it’s good defence or good offence, consistency wins.”

These are team games, down to the bone, to the point where you can pick three or four Conn Smyth winners from either team and make the argument. Both these teams love puck possession, limit opponents’ chances, and interlock with their relative strength and weaknesses like puzzles. But within that bigger game, maybe Chara is vulnerable to Chicago’s high end, to their skill, to Toews and Kane and company. Maybe they’ve found a blueprint to the colossus. Only one way to find out.

“I don’t think it was Zdeno’s fault. It was our team. I think they did some good work in our end, but our team was completely ordinary yesterday,” said Bruins coach Claude Julien Thursday, in French. “If we can play a better game, we’ll see whether that’s the case, or whether Toews was right.”

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BOSTON, MA - JUNE 17: Zdeno Chara #33 of the Boston Bruins checks Bryan Bickell #29 of the Chicago Blackhawks to the ice late in the game in Game Three of the 2013 NHL Stanley Cup Final at TD Garden on June 17, 2013 in Boston, Massachusetts.

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